June 7th

You’ve probably come to the conclusion that I’m a techno-fan, so it should be no surprise to you that I like robots. Robots come in an amazingly wide array of shapes, sizes and functions, but unlike the dire and terrifying predictions of early Sci-Fi movies, they have not yet assumed human form and marched on our nation’s capitals ready to take over the world. In fact, very few robots can walk, let alone march, with anywhere near the ease or grace of we, their human creators, users and overlords.
Making a human-like robot walk like us has led to a great deal of research into how we walk, and this has led to a rather surprising discovery. In the earliest stages of learning bipedal motion, we adopt a very simple style that basically involves falling forward. That’s right, our earliest way to walk is to toss on foot forward and then, effectively, to fall forward with it until it hits the ground, at which point we toss the other one ahead, and so on. Apparently, it’s the simplest way for us to keep our balance while moving forward, and it’s keeping upright without tipping over that’s the big trick to walking.
The first way we learn to walk then, is the perfect way to get going. It requires little energy and skill, making it a natural “first step” in our progress to jogging or other more sophisticated or stylish ways of moving forward. In other words, as long as we keep falling ahead of ourselves under control, we won’t tip over out of control.
There’s a curious kind of message for people of faith in this concept of the controlled fall. No, I’m not talking about the big ‘F’ fall, as in the fall we took when we picked up the forbidden fruit and got knocked out of heaven, but the controlled fall as in, for every two steps upwards, there are the odd times when we end up falling flat on portions of our anatomy that are not intended to touch the ground.
We could, of course, avoid any and all risk of hitting the ground inappropriately or unexpectedly by not moving at all. But not moving at all isn’t a guarantee we won’t fall down either. Ask a soldier standing on patrol and he or she will tell you that it ain’t easy just to hold one position for a long time. So, if we’re going to fall down anyway, it might as well be under our own terms rather than simply because of exhaustion or the prodding of someone with an unkind or unhelpful disposition.
The benefits of the controlled fall are myriad: it gets’ us places; it lets us decide what we’re falling for; it shows God we’re trying; it keeps us busy, provides a little exercise, and who knows, after a while we might learn to keep moving forward in complete control, with grace and style, rather than just tossing one foot ahead of the other just so as not to fall down.
The final advantage to the controlled fall is that we’re never alone; when we walk, however imperfectly, in faith, Jesus is there beside us, helping us along, picking us up when we hit the ground, healing us when it‘s a particularly hard hit, and celebrating with us when we move forward. At least that’s the way I see it.